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Freedom March: Activists Reject Egypt's Gaza Offer

Members of an international group gathered in Cairo to protest against the siege of Gaza have rejected an Egyptian offer to allow 100
of them entry into the Palestinian territory.

Hedy
Epstein, 85, (L) a a US activist and Holocaust survivor, protests
outside the Egyptian Press Syndicate in downtown Cairo against the
Egyptian government's decision not to allow them to travel to the Gaza
Strip. Protest leaders stranded in Cairo rejected an Egyptian offer on
Tuesday to allow only 100 out of about 1,300 protesters into blockaded
Gaza.
(AFP/Victoria Hazou)

Organizers of the Gaza Freedom March (GFM),
which is comprised of 1,300 people from 42 different countries,
declined the offer on Wednesday, saying "we refuse to whitewash the
siege of Gaza".

Egyptian authorities had initially said the group
would not be allowed

to cross the border, citing security reasons and a
"sensitive situation".

The activists were hoping to march into
Gaza on the anniversary of Israel's 22-day offensive on the territory
as a sign of solidarity with its people, carrying with them aid and
supplies.

Egypt's Rafah border crossing point is the only entrance point into the Gaza Strip not controlled by Israel.

However,
both it and the Israeli-controlled border points have largely remained
sealed since 2007, when Palestinian faction Hamas took full control of
the territory after brutal infighting with rivals Fatah.

Cairo concession

March organizers had called the Egyptian government's concession a "partial victory" but said the offer was not sufficient.

Ali
Abunimah, co-founder of the Electronic Intifada and a participant in
the march, posted to his blog, saying that "it's not enough and the
pressure and protests should be kept up".

"However, getting 100
or 1,300 into Gaza does not end the siege by itself. This is not about
getting some or even all into Gaza, its building global support and
pressure to end the siege of Gaza," he said.

Roqayah Chamseddine,
a US student attending the march, told Al Jazeera: "Our mission is not
to be divided and sending only 100 of over 1,300 would be doing just
that.

"For anyone to claim that Egypt was doing us a favor by offering to allow 100 GFM members to go is asinine and baseless.

"Those
borders must be opened and as long as Egypt continues to seemingly aid
Israel in subjugating the people of Palestine we will also continue to
resist an protest."

Gaza Freedom March members have held multiple
small protests in Cairo, as well as on Tuesday joining Egyptian
activists to demonstrate against a one-day visit by Binyamin Netanyahu,
Israel's prime minister.

Earlier on Tuesday, around 40 US
citizens marching to their embassy in the Egyptian capital were met
along the way by riot police, who corralled them into groups of 10
before allowing them access, participants said.

On Sunday and
Monday, about 80 people held a sit-in outside the French embassy to try
to rally international support for the movement.

Others, such as
US citizen Hedy Epstein, an 85-year-old Holocaust survivor, have gone
on hunger strike to protest against Egypt's refusal to allow the march
to proceed.

Viva Palestina

A separate aid convoy,
which had been trying to reach Gaza by way of Jordan's Red Sea port of
Aqaba, has meanwhile agreed to travel via Syria instead.

The Viva
Palestina convoy, carrying 210 lorries full of humanitarian aid for the
people of Gaza, crossed into Syria on Tuesday after spending five days
in Jordan, negotiating with the Egyptian consul there.

It is now
expected to set sail from the Syrian port of Latakia to the Egyptian
port of El Arish on the Mediterranean, and then cross through Rafah
into Gaza from there.

A statement from the Egypt's ministry of
information said that George Galloway, the British member of parliament
leading the convoy, had been told by November 10 that the group had to
travel through El Arish, even though it is not the most direct route.